Coupling sessions from tech industry leaders with a keynote lineup featuring IT leaders from leading businesses, last week's PuppetConf 2015 in Portland, Ore., concluded as one of the must-attend IT operations conferences of the year.

From beginners to advanced users of Puppet Labs products, this year's conference had something for everyone. Sessions ranged from how to get started with Puppet, modules and related technologies to advanced tips and tricks for using Puppet, PuppetDB, Razor, Facter and more. Sessions also included seminars focused on career development and people-related topics such as team building and team management.

The keynotes, training and general sessions were designed “to empower attendees and their teams to elevate their personal and professional development,” according to a recent PuppetLabs announcement.

Luke Kanies, founder and CEO of PuppetLabs, kicked off the conference with a keynote on Thursday, highlighting the state of PuppetLabs and where it's going. Nate Loomis of Wells Fargo followed Kanies, sharing his insights and recommendations for tackling today’s biggest IT challenges. Friday's keynotes included Komal Mangtani, Uber's head of business intelligence, who shared lessons learned from leading innovation in both traditional enterprises and fast-paced start-ups.

PuppetConf 2015 also included, for the first time, an IT Leader Breakout session on Thursday, dedicated to emerging trends in IT, the state of DevOps, the value of automation, and real-world examples of companies using automation to elevate the role of IT within their organizations. The breakout consisted of a half-day of presentations geared to IT managers, executives and people just learning about the strategic value of Puppet.

Puppet Labs, a leader in IT automation, provides system administrators the operational agility, efficiency and insight they need to proactively manage dynamic infrastructure, scaling from tens of servers to thousands, both on premise and in the cloud. Thousands of the world's leading organizations use Puppet Labs software to configure and manage their IT infrastructure, including Bank of America, Cisco, NYSE, Salesforce.com and WebEx.